God Save the People! From the Stamp Act to Bunker Hill

February

Early American History Seminar Panel Discussion: Law and the American Revolution4 February 2014.Tuesday, 5:15PM - 7:30PMRSVP requiredMary Sarah Bilder, Boston College Law School, T.H. Breen, University of Vermont and Huntington Library, Bruce Mann, Harvard Law School, Kent Newmyer, University of ConnecticutModerator: Alan Rogers, Boston CollegeBe sure to RSVP for this program by emailing seminars@masshist.org or phoning 617-646-0568.
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There are no original essays to read for this program, but if you have not done so you might wish to read chapter 2 of Grant Gilmore's The Ages of American Law (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1977) in preparation for this program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

Building Closed Snow Closure5 February 2014.Wednesday, all dayThe MHS is closed on Wednesday, February 5th, due to inclement weather. We anticipate reopening as ...

The MHS is closed on Wednesday, February 5th, due to inclement weather. We anticipate reopening as normal on Thursday, February 6th. Please check the website and/or call 617-646-0500 for further updates.

James Michael Curley was perhaps the most prolific politician in Massachusetts history. In honor of the 100th anniversary of his first election as Mayor of Boston, this talk will highlight the building of public works in Boston during his time in office. Parks, police and fire stations, public schools, transit expansion, hospitals, beaches and public art erected during his tenure abound in Boston and provide comfort, beauty and long term significant economic benefits for visitors and Bostonians alike.

Lawrence Overlan has been researching, teaching, speaking and writing about James Michael Curley for over a decade.

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

Public Program Created Equal: The Loving Story12 February 2014.Wednesday, 5:30PM - 7:30PMPlease RSVPFilm Screening & DiscussionFacilitated by Joanne Pope Melish, University of KentuckyMildred and Richard Loving knew it was technically illegal for them to live as a married couple in ...

Mildred and Richard Loving knew it was technically illegal for them to live as a married couple in Virginia because she was of African American and Native American descent and he was white. The Loving Story, nominated for an Emmy in 2013, brings to life the Lovings’ marriage and the legal battle that followed. The film will be shown in its entirety.

Joanne Pope Melish is an Associate Professor of History at the University of Kentucky and a visiting scholar in American Studies at Brown University. She is the author of Disowning Slavery: Gradual Emancipation and “Race” in New England, 1780-1860.

Created Equal: America’s Civil Rights Struggle is made possible through a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, as part of its Bridging Cultures initiative, in partnership with the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History.

Tuberculosis caused up to a third of all deaths in antebellum New England. Attempting to make sense of this devastation, sufferers—and society—created "illness narratives" to interpret their experience and provide meaning, consolation, or blame. This study examines poor consumptives in the Boston Almshouse, seeking to "open out" their lives and better understand how they—and others—made sense of their affliction.

Member Event, Special Event, Public Program Tell It with Pride Preview Reception20 February 2014.Thursday, 6:00PM - 8:00PMPlease RSVPThis event is open only to MHS Fellows and Members.MHS Fellows and Members are invited to a special preview and reception for Tell ...

In commemoration of the Civil War battle of Fort Wagner led by Colonel Robert Gould Shaw and the men of the 54th Massachusetts Regiment and in cooperation with the Massachusetts Historical Society, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. has organized the exhibition Tell It with Pride: The 54th Massachusetts Regiment and Augustus Saint-Gaudens’ Shaw Memorial.

The exhibition celebrates Augustus Saint-Gaudens’ magisterial Shaw Memorial (1883–1900). When Saint-Gaudens created the monument, he based his likeness of Shaw on photographs of the colonel, but for his depiction of the other soldiers, he hired African American men to pose in his studio. This exhibition seeks to make real the soldiers of the 54th represented anonymously in the memorial. It brings together vintage photographic portraits of members of the regiment and of the men and women who recruited, nursed, taught, and guided them.

Throughout the run of the exhibition special programs are planned in cooperation with the Museum of African American History, the Boston African American National Historic Site, the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Regiment Company A, and the Friends of the Public Garden.

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

The Revolution forced many changes on Massachusetts society including the relationships and expectations of those living in the countryside. Courthouse takeovers began in the summer of 1786 when officials failed to address petitions for relief from taxes and judgments rendered against farmers by debt-enforcing courts. Capt. Job Shattuck was one of the early leaders who sided with the protestors, and he paid dearly for the effort. Shocking new evidence found in court records allows us to reassess his role and reputation.

This research project asks, in what ways can place-based ethnography contribute to our understanding of complex historical and social relations in settler-colonial society? It begins with Norridgewock village in the Kennebec River Valley of Maine as a focal point, understanding this village to be simultaneously a physical place, a collection of stories, and a set of relationships. It then follows the networks of social relationships, memory narratives, and historical knowledges outward in order to reveal the roles that place, history, and memory play in the negotiation of relationships in settler-colonial spaces.

Immigration and Urban History Seminar Curating the City: The Framing of Los Angeles25 February 2014.Tuesday, 5:15PM - 7:30PMRSVP requiredCatherine Gudis, University of California—RiversideComment: Carlo Rotella, Boston CollegeBe sure to RSVP for this program by emailing seminars@masshist.org or phoning 617-646-0568.
Authors ...

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

Public Program Handel and Haydn Society: Bringing Music to Life for 200 Years26 February 2014.Wednesday, 6:00PM - 7:30PMPre-Performance reception at 5:30pmHandel and Haydn Society Period Instrument Orchestra and ChorusMembers of the Period Instrument Orchestra and Chorus, along with Christopher Hogwood Historically ...

Members of the Period Instrument Orchestra and Chorus, along with Christopher Hogwood Historically Informed Performance Fellow Teresa M. Neff, share the 200-year history of the Handel and Haydn Society through music and stories, The program includes an eclectic range of works from the 18th century: hymns by William Billings, chamber music by Mozart and Beethoven, and excerpts from Haydn's The Creation and Handel's Messiah.

Since 1815, the Handel and Haydn Society has shared the inspirational and transformational power of Baroque and Classical music with people throughout Boston and the country. Join H +H for an instrumental and vocal chamber performance that will share the history of the institution, considered America’s oldest continuously performing arts organization.

To Reserve: There is a $30 fee ($20 fee for Fellows and Members). Click here to register online or call the MHS reservations line at 617-646-0560.

Public Program, Author Talk George Washington: Gentleman Warrior27 February 2014.Thursday, 6:00PM - 7:00PMLocation: Boston Public Library, Copley SquareSteven BrumwellStephen Brumwell’s new book focuses on George Washington, the feisty young frontier officer ...

Stephen Brumwell’s new book focuses on George Washington, the feisty young frontier officer and the tough forty-something commander of the revolutionaries’ Continental Army. It examines his long and chequered military career, tracing his evolution as a soldier, and his changing attitude to the waging of war.

Dr. Stephen Brumwell is an award-winning independent historian and journalist. He attended the University of Leeds, gaining a PhD in history and British Academy funding to research eighteenth-century North America. Brumwell's widely acclaimed books include Redcoats: The British Soldier and War in the Americas, 1755–1763; White Devil: A True Story of War, Savagery and Vengeance in Colonial America; and Paths of Glory: The Life and Death of General James Wolfe.

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

Americans tend to mark the surrender at Appomattox as the end of the Civil War, but the last battle came more than a month later, the last surrender a month after that, and the official “cessation of hostilities” more than a year later. A similar Appomattox effect shapes the way Americans think of other wars, making people assume, even when well-known facts indicate otherwise, that wars have discrete, identifiable endpoints. This lunch discussion raises some of the issues associated with identifying the end of any U.S. war in light of the search for an end of the Civil War.

In A Traveled First Lady: Writings of Louisa Catherine Adams, editors Margaret Hogan and C. James Taylor selected excerpts from diaries and memoirs of Adams’s most revealing comments on life at European courts, the difficulty of being an outsider, Abigail Adams’s Quincy, and the importance of society and etiquette in early Washington D.C. She is best remembered as one the capital’s most accomplished hostesses as hundreds of guests regularly attended her Tuesday evenings of conversation, music, dancing, and refreshments. Join the editors for a social evening with Louisa. There will be conversation and refreshments—but no dancing!

Margaret A. Hogan is an independent editorial consultant and the former Managing Editor of the Adams Papers at the Massachusetts Historical Society. C. James Taylor is Editor in Chief of the Adams Papers.

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

Public Program Created Equal: The Abolitionists12 March 2014.Wednesday, 5:30PM - 7:30PMPlease RSVPFilm Screening & DiscussionFacilitated by Joanne Pope Melish, University of KentuckyThe Abolitionists brings to life the struggles of the men and women who led the battle to ...

The Abolitionists brings to life the struggles of the men and women who led the battle to end slavery.Using this film to ground our discussion, we will explore the lives of the individuals who participated in the antislavery movement: newspaper editor William Lloyd Garrison; former slave, author, and activist Frederick Douglass; Angelina Grimké, daughter of a rich South Carolina slaveholder; Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of Uncle Tom's Cabin; and John Brown, ultimately executed for his armed seizure of the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry. Clips from the film will be shown at the event, and the film can be viewed in its entirety at: createdequal.neh.gov.

Joanne Pope Melish is an Associate Professor of History at the University of Kentucky and a visiting scholar in American Studies at Brown University. She is the author of Disowning Slavery: Gradual Emancipation and “Race” in New England, 1780-1860.

Created Equal: America’s Civil Rights Struggle is made possible through a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, as part of its Bridging Cultures initiative, in partnership with the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History.

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

Public Program, Author Talk The Lodge Women, Their Men and Their Times17 March 2014.Monday, 12:00PM - 1:00PMEmily LodgeLike a Whitman poem, the saga of the Lodge family has unfolded in tandem with the history of the ...

Like a Whitman poem, the saga of the Lodge family has unfolded in tandem with the history of the great American experiment itself. Yet while the biographies of the Lodge patriarchs have been well-documented, the stories of the influential Lodge women have never been authoritatively chronicled. From the earliest days of the American colonies, through the Gilded Age, and into the first years of the 21st century, The Lodge Women Their Men, and Their Times traces her family’s remarkable history through its female figures, constructing a narrative that is at once intensely personal, political, and wholly universal.

Based on archival research, interviews, and personal memoirs, Emily Lodge presents her ancestors' stories largely through their own voices, heard in a rich collection of personal letters exchanged with the luminaries of their times, whose lives were linked with the Lodges by politics, art, and family: Henry Adams, Henry James, Theodore Roosevelt, John Hay, Elizabeth Cameron and Edith Wharton, some of whose letters are published here for the first time.From her unique descendant’s view on a long line of prominent Lodge women, the author recalls their grace, dash, and political influence through a sweep of history that illuminates the pages with the incandescent human truths of a distinguished family's life and times.

Over the last thirty years a fascination with public policy has taken Emily into government, journalism, business and academia. As a print journalist, she focused on law and the courts. As a speech-writer for a US Congressman and a US Ambassador to France, her domain was foreign policy. As an award-winning television documentary researcher for 60 Minutes, she helped prove someone innocent. Emily won an Emmy Award for a CBS News Special Report about education. On moving to Europe, she became a correspondent for Brussel’s leading monthly business magazine. Her ParisVoice features column were known for their witty and perceptive observations about public figures. She has written brochures for companies and helped create a major fund-raising drive for INSEAD, Europe’s premier business school. A graduate of Georgetown University in diplomatic history, she is currently writing news analysis from the Middle East.

In the spring of 1689, the Dominion of New England collapsed when provisional authorities in Boston and New York seized power. The governor-general was placed under house arrest and the northern garrisons ordered abandoned, exposing the English frontier to ongoing attacks by French and Abenaki soldiers. The following year, ad hoc colonial governments coordinated and launched attacks on Quebec and Montreal. How did Puritan divines and a German militia captain use war with the French to legitimate their authority to colonists, colonial leaders, and Native American allies? How did they justify strategy, finance, and diplomacy? Join us to learn more about this fascinating project. - This event has been rescheduled from February 5, when it was postponed due to snow..

Special Event An Evening at the Bostonian Society19 March 2014.Wednesday, 6:00PM - 8:00PMThis event is open only to members of the Jeremy Belknap Circle.Members of the Jeremy Belknap Circle are invited to an evening at the Bostonian Society located at ...

Members of the Jeremy Belknap Circle are invited to an evening at the Bostonian Society located at 206 Washington Street in Boston. Brian LeMay and Nat Sheidley will discuss ongoing plans and lead a tour of the building, including the tower (and its resident ghost). A reception will follow.

This program will feature a conversation with Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, 300th Anniversary University Professor at Harvard, who is using diaries (men's and women's) in her broader study of Mormon history; Louisa Thomas, an independent scholar and the author of "Conscience" (about her grandfather Norman Thomas), who is writing a biography of Louisa Catherine Adams; and Noelle Baker, Editorial Consultant to The Writings of Henry D. Thoreau, who is preparing a digital edition of Mary Moody Emerson's diary.

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

Member Event, Special Event New Faces & New Acquisitions27 March 2014.Thursday, 5:30PM - 7:30PMPlease RSVPThis event is open only to new MHS Fellows and Members.Following a reception, new Fellows and Members are invited to join us for a unique opportunity to ...

Following a reception, new Fellows and Members are invited to join us for a unique opportunity to learn more about and view a selection of the Society's most recent acquisitions, including letters from a stunning collection of Adams and Cranch family correspondence and items from the Civil War archives of Capt. Luis F. Emilio of the 54th Massachusetts Regiment. Enjoy the chance to view Tell It with Pride: The 54th Massachusetts Regiment and Augustus Saint-Gaudens' Shaw Memorial. Please call 617-646-0560 or register online by clicking the ticket icon above.

Special Event, Public Program Tell it with Pride29 March 2014.Saturday, 12:00PM - 4:00PMPlease RSVP54th Massachusetts Volunteer Regiment Company AKathryn Greenthal and Henry DuffyVisitors are invited to enjoy an afternoon program of exhibition tours and special talks at the MHS ...

Visitors are invited to enjoy an afternoon program of exhibition tours and special talks at the MHS related to the Tell It With Pride exhibition.

12:00: Join us for a presentation from the men of the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Regiment Company A, a company of civilian re-enactment personnel who keep alive the legacy of the unit through living history displays, educational briefings to the general public, and Civil War period encampments and re-enactments.

1:00 Time to view the exhibition and for informal conversation with the men of the 54th Regiment.

To Reserve: Click here to register online or call the MHS reservations line at 617-646-0560. Please register if you plan to attend ANY part of this program (even if you can not join us for the entire afternoon).

Public Program, Author Talk American Jews & America’s Game1 April 2014.Tuesday, 12:00PM - 1:00PMLarry RuttmanLarry Ruttman will discuss the four main subjects of his book: baseball; American Jewish life in the ...

Larry Ruttman will discuss the four main subjects of his book: baseball; American Jewish life in the United States over the last century; American history; and the revealing personal lives of people involved with the game. Compiled using oral histories gathered from nearly 50 Jewish baseball luminaries (who served the game both on and off the field), Ruttman's book offers an anecdotal study of American Jews and the fellow citizens with whom they interacted during momentous times for America, set against the backdrop of a quintessentially American game that fascinates us all.

Larry Ruttman, Fellow of the Massachusetts Historical Society, is the author of Voices of Brookline, a national finalist for the Award of Merit of the American Association of State and Local History. He has practiced law in Boston for more than fifty years and produces and hosts a television interview show in his hometown of Brookline, Massachusetts.

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

Brown Bag Liberal Religion and Slavery in America, 1775-18652 April 2014.Wednesday, 12:00PM - 1:00PMChristopher Cameron, University of North Carolina at CharlotteThis talk will explore the disparate ways that liberal ministers engaged with the institution of ...

This talk will explore the disparate ways that liberal ministers engaged with the institution of slavery, whether as proslavery thinkers, colonizationists, or radical abolitionists. It will examine the theological underpinnings of liberals' views on slavery, as well as the differences between Unitarian, Universalist, and Transcendentalists' engagement with the institution.

Based on the Pulitzer Prize–winning book by Douglas Blackmon, Slavery by Another Name tells the stories of men, charged with crimes and often guilty of nothing, who were bought, sold, abused, and subjected to deadly working conditions. Raymond Arsenault’s 2007 book Freedom Riders served as the basis for the film of the same name, which tells the terrifying, moving, and suspenseful story of a time when white and black volunteers riding a bus into the Deep South risked being jailed, beaten, or killed, as white local and state authorities ignored or encouraged violent attacks. Clips from the two films will be shown, and they can be viewed online in their entirety at: createdequal.neh.gov.

Joanne Pope Melish is an Associate Professor of History at the University of Kentucky and a visiting scholar in American Studies at Brown University. She is the author of Disowning Slavery: Gradual Emancipation and “Race” in New England, 1780-1860.

Created Equal: America’s Civil Rights Struggle is made possible through a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, as part of its Bridging Cultures initiative, in partnership with the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History.

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

This paper discusses various ways in which the everyday realities of slavery shaped gender relations in Afro-New England families. While the structure of slave families in the region was unusually matrifocal, these families nonetheless exhibited a number of patriarchal tendencies. Enslaved African families in New England therefore complicate the assumption of much scholarship that the structure of slave families defined their normative values.

When Massachusetts Governor John A. Andrew proposed to raise the first military unit consisting of black soldiers during the Civil War, he was assured by Secretary of War Edwin Stanton that the men would be paid, clothed, and treated in the same way as white troops. As the recruiting posters and newspaper advertisements stated, this included a state bounty and a monthly pay of $13. In July of 1863, an order was issued in Washington fixing the compensation of black soldiers at the laborers' rate of $10 per month. This amount was offered on several occasions to the men of the 54th, but was continually refused. Governor Andrew and the Massachusetts legislature, feeling responsible for the $3 discrepancy in pay promised to the troops, passed an act in November of 1863 providing the difference from state funds. The men refused to accept this resolution, however, demanding that they receive full soldier pay from the federal government.

This event has been canceled. Please contact the education department for more information: education@masshist.org or 617-646-0557.

Join us as we explore the role of African Americans in Massachusetts in the era of the Civil War!

Day one (April 22) will take place at the Massachusetts Historical Society, where participants can view original documents and artifacts that shed light on the antislavery movement, the work of the 54th Regiment and its supporters, and the creation of Augustus Saint-Gaudens’ memorial on Beacon Street.

Day two (April 23) will take place on Beacon Hill. In the morning, we will take a walking tour through the neighborhood with a ranger from Boston African American National Historic Site. After a lunch on your own at Faneuil Hall, we will regroup for a program at the Museum of African American History, which includes a tour of the recently restored African Meeting House.

This workshop is open to all K-12 teachers and library media specialists. The $55 registration fee covers lunch on April 22, materials, and admission to the Museum of African American History. Teachers can earn 10 Professional Development Points for their participation.

This event has been canceled. Please contact the education department for more information: education@masshist.org or 617-646-0557.

Join us as we explore the role of African Americans in Massachusetts in the era of the Civil War!

Day one (April 22) will take place at the Massachusetts Historical Society, where participants can view original documents and artifacts that shed light on the antislavery movement, the work of the 54th Regiment and its supporters, and the creation of Augustus Saint-Gaudens’ memorial on Beacon Street.

Day two (April 23) will take place on Beacon Hill. In the morning, we will take a walking tour through the neighborhood with a ranger from Boston African American National Historic Site. After a lunch on your own at Faneuil Hall, we will regroup for a program at the Museum of African American History, which includes a tour of the recently restored African Meeting House.

This workshop is open to all K-12 teachers and library media specialists. The $55 registration fee covers lunch on April 22, materials, and admission to the Museum of African American History. Teachers can earn 10 Professional Development Points for their participation.

This project examines the networks of men and women who helped support education efforts in the American settlements in Liberia, West Africa. These philanthropists, many of them based in Massachusetts, helped establish formal and informal schools in the former American colonies and planned for a college, which opened for classes as Liberia College (now the University of Liberia) in 1863. How did these American sponsors manage an institution over four thousand miles away?

For Zabdiel Boylston Adams, an 1853 graduate of Harvard Medical School, the Civil War was a watershed and a defining period. On the afternoon of July 2, 1863, the doctor set up a makeshift hospital close to the field of battle. Having noticed how many soldiers were dying during transport from combat to distant medical care, Adams pioneered on-site medical treatments. He labored so long in surgeries at Gettysburg that he was nearly blinded with exhaustion. At the Battle of the Wilderness Adams was severely wounded. Captured by Confederate forces, his shattered left leg useless and gangrenous, he treated himself by pouring pure nitric acid into his wounds, a treatment that must have been as excruciating as it was efficacious. A man at the nexus of two distinguished New England families—Boylston and Adams—at a particularly dramatic moment in history, Dr. Adams is more than an ancestor or historical figure; to his great-grandson, Mitchell L. Adams, he is a legend.

Massachusetts women played a vital role in recruiting, supporting, and caring for the men who fought in the Civil War. Learn more about their heroic efforts through Society's current exhibition Tell It with Pride. L'Merchie Frazier, Director of Education at Boston's Museum of African American History will be on hand to discuss some of the evocative photographs and objects on display.

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

McEvoy’s paper, “‘A Christian and Democratic Attitude’: The Catholic Campaign for Education and Enlightenment on U.S. Immigration Policy, 1952-1957,” examines the Catholic campaign for comprehensive immigration reform during and in the wake of the McCarran-Walter Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, which removed discrimination on the basis of race from federal immigration policy but retained the national origins quota system. Battisti’s essay, “‘Whom Shall We Welcome?’ Italian Americans and Immigration Reform Campaigns, 1948-1965,” examines the efforts of Italian Americans who both assisted Italian immigrants to the U.S. after World War II and who joined in a broader movement to abolish the national origins system and thereby reform the nation’s immigration policies in the 1950s and 1960s.

Jefferson and Hamilton is the story of the fierce struggle—both public and, ultimately, bitterly personal—between two titans. Both men were visionaries, but their visions of what the United States should be were diametrically opposed. Jefferson believed passionately in individual liberty and a more egalitarian society, with a weak central government and greater powers for the states. Hamilton sought to build a powerful national government that could ensure the young nation’s security and drive it toward economic greatness.

John Ferling, a leading authority on late 18th and early 19th century American history, is the author of many books, including Almost a Miracle: The American Victory in the War for Independence, Adams vs. Jefferson: The Tumultuous Election of 1800, Setting the World Ablaze: Washington, Adams, and Jefferson in the American Revolution, and the award-winning A Leap in the Dark: The Struggle to Create the American Republic.

Early American History SeminarPanel Discussion: Law and the American Revolution4 February 2014.Tuesday, 5:15PM - 7:30PMSeminars are free and open to the public; RSVP required.Subscribe to received advance copies of the seminar papers.Mary Sarah Bilder, Boston College Law School, T.H. Breen, University of Vermont and Huntington Library, Bruce Mann, Harvard Law School, Kent Newmyer, University of ConnecticutModerator: Alan Rogers, Boston College

There are no original essays to read for this program, but if you have not done so you might wish to read chapter 2 of Grant Gilmore's The Ages of American Law (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1977) in preparation for this program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

The MHS is closed on Wednesday, February 5th, due to inclement weather. We anticipate reopening as normal on Thursday, February 6th. Please check the website and/or call 617-646-0500 for further updates.

Public ProgramBoston’s Mayor James Michael Curley: The Quintessential Politician & Public Works Patron6 February 2014.Thursday, 12:00PM - 1:00PMthis event is freeLawrence Overlan

James Michael Curley was perhaps the most prolific politician in Massachusetts history. In honor of the 100th anniversary of his first election as Mayor of Boston, this talk will highlight the building of public works in Boston during his time in office. Parks, police and fire stations, public schools, transit expansion, hospitals, beaches and public art erected during his tenure abound in Boston and provide comfort, beauty and long term significant economic benefits for visitors and Bostonians alike.

Lawrence Overlan has been researching, teaching, speaking and writing about James Michael Curley for over a decade.

Environmental History Seminar"A tacit proclamation of achievement by the Race": Landscapes Built With African American Civilian Conservation Corps Labor in the Rural Midwest11 February 2014.Tuesday, 5:15PM - 7:30PMSeminars are free and open to the public; RSVP required.Subscribe to received advance copies of the seminar papers.Brian McCammack, Williams CollegeComment: Neil Maher, NJIT—Rutgers University Newark Federated History Department

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

Public ProgramCreated Equal: The Loving Story12 February 2014.Wednesday, 5:30PM - 7:30PMPlease RSVPregistration required at no costFilm Screening & DiscussionFacilitated by Joanne Pope Melish, University of Kentucky

Mildred and Richard Loving knew it was technically illegal for them to live as a married couple in Virginia because she was of African American and Native American descent and he was white. The Loving Story, nominated for an Emmy in 2013, brings to life the Lovings’ marriage and the legal battle that followed. The film will be shown in its entirety.

Joanne Pope Melish is an Associate Professor of History at the University of Kentucky and a visiting scholar in American Studies at Brown University. She is the author of Disowning Slavery: Gradual Emancipation and “Race” in New England, 1780-1860.

Created Equal: America’s Civil Rights Struggle is made possible through a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, as part of its Bridging Cultures initiative, in partnership with the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History.

Tuberculosis caused up to a third of all deaths in antebellum New England. Attempting to make sense of this devastation, sufferers—and society—created "illness narratives" to interpret their experience and provide meaning, consolation, or blame. This study examines poor consumptives in the Boston Almshouse, seeking to "open out" their lives and better understand how they—and others—made sense of their affliction.

Member Event, Special Event, Public ProgramTell It with Pride Preview Reception20 February 2014.Thursday, 6:00PM - 8:00PMPlease RSVPregistration required at no costThis event is open only to MHS Fellows and Members.

ExhibitionTell It with Pride: The 54th Massachusetts Regiment and Augustus Saint-Gaudens' Shaw Memorial21 February 2014 to 23 May 2014this event is freeOpen Monday through Saturday from 10 AM to 4 PMThe exhibition is organized by the National Gallery of Art, Washington

In commemoration of the Civil War battle of Fort Wagner led by Colonel Robert Gould Shaw and the men of the 54th Massachusetts Regiment and in cooperation with the Massachusetts Historical Society, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. has organized the exhibition Tell It with Pride: The 54th Massachusetts Regiment and Augustus Saint-Gaudens’ Shaw Memorial.

The exhibition celebrates Augustus Saint-Gaudens’ magisterial Shaw Memorial (1883–1900). When Saint-Gaudens created the monument, he based his likeness of Shaw on photographs of the colonel, but for his depiction of the other soldiers, he hired African American men to pose in his studio. This exhibition seeks to make real the soldiers of the 54th represented anonymously in the memorial. It brings together vintage photographic portraits of members of the regiment and of the men and women who recruited, nursed, taught, and guided them.

Throughout the run of the exhibition special programs are planned in cooperation with the Museum of African American History, the Boston African American National Historic Site, the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Regiment Company A, and the Friends of the Public Garden.

MHS TourMHS Tour: The History and Collections of the MHS22 February 2014.Saturday, 10:00AM - 11:30AMthis event is free

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

The Revolution forced many changes on Massachusetts society including the relationships and expectations of those living in the countryside. Courthouse takeovers began in the summer of 1786 when officials failed to address petitions for relief from taxes and judgments rendered against farmers by debt-enforcing courts. Capt. Job Shattuck was one of the early leaders who sided with the protestors, and he paid dearly for the effort. Shocking new evidence found in court records allows us to reassess his role and reputation.

Brown Bag"A Wigwam with Two Fires": Place and Historical Narrative in Indian-Settler Relations in the Kennebec River Valley24 February 2014.Monday, 12:00PM - 1:00PMthis event is freeAshley Smith, Cornell University

This research project asks, in what ways can place-based ethnography contribute to our understanding of complex historical and social relations in settler-colonial society? It begins with Norridgewock village in the Kennebec River Valley of Maine as a focal point, understanding this village to be simultaneously a physical place, a collection of stories, and a set of relationships. It then follows the networks of social relationships, memory narratives, and historical knowledges outward in order to reveal the roles that place, history, and memory play in the negotiation of relationships in settler-colonial spaces.

Immigration and Urban History SeminarCurating the City: The Framing of Los Angeles25 February 2014.Tuesday, 5:15PM - 7:30PMSeminars are free and open to the public; RSVP required.Subscribe to received advance copies of the seminar papers.Catherine Gudis, University of California—RiversideComment: Carlo Rotella, Boston College

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

Public ProgramHandel and Haydn Society: Bringing Music to Life for 200 Years26 February 2014.Wednesday, 6:00PM - 7:30PMregistration requiredPre-Performance reception at 5:30pmHandel and Haydn Society Period Instrument Orchestra and Chorus

Members of the Period Instrument Orchestra and Chorus, along with Christopher Hogwood Historically Informed Performance Fellow Teresa M. Neff, share the 200-year history of the Handel and Haydn Society through music and stories, The program includes an eclectic range of works from the 18th century: hymns by William Billings, chamber music by Mozart and Beethoven, and excerpts from Haydn's The Creation and Handel's Messiah.

Since 1815, the Handel and Haydn Society has shared the inspirational and transformational power of Baroque and Classical music with people throughout Boston and the country. Join H +H for an instrumental and vocal chamber performance that will share the history of the institution, considered America’s oldest continuously performing arts organization.

To Reserve: There is a $30 fee ($20 fee for Fellows and Members). Click here to register online or call the MHS reservations line at 617-646-0560.

Stephen Brumwell’s new book focuses on George Washington, the feisty young frontier officer and the tough forty-something commander of the revolutionaries’ Continental Army. It examines his long and chequered military career, tracing his evolution as a soldier, and his changing attitude to the waging of war.

Dr. Stephen Brumwell is an award-winning independent historian and journalist. He attended the University of Leeds, gaining a PhD in history and British Academy funding to research eighteenth-century North America. Brumwell's widely acclaimed books include Redcoats: The British Soldier and War in the Americas, 1755–1763; White Devil: A True Story of War, Savagery and Vengeance in Colonial America; and Paths of Glory: The Life and Death of General James Wolfe.

MHS TourMHS Tour: The History and Collections of the MHS1 March 2014.Saturday, 10:00AM - 11:30AMthis event is free

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

Early American History SeminarNegro Cloth: Mastering the Market for Slave Clothing in Antebellum America4 March 2014.Tuesday, 5:15PM - 7:30PMSeminars are free and open to the public; RSVP required.Subscribe to received advance copies of the seminar papers.Seth Rockman, Brown UniversityComment: David Quigley, Boston College

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

Brown BagThe Appomattox Effect: Searching for the End of War in the American Civil War and Beyond5 March 2014.Wednesday, 12:00PM - 1:00PMthis event is freeMichael Vorenberg, Brown University

Americans tend to mark the surrender at Appomattox as the end of the Civil War, but the last battle came more than a month later, the last surrender a month after that, and the official “cessation of hostilities” more than a year later. A similar Appomattox effect shapes the way Americans think of other wars, making people assume, even when well-known facts indicate otherwise, that wars have discrete, identifiable endpoints. This lunch discussion raises some of the issues associated with identifying the end of any U.S. war in light of the search for an end of the Civil War.

Public Program, Special EventA Traveled First Lady: An Evening with Louisa Catherine Adams6 March 2014.Thursday, 6:00PM - 7:30PMPlease RSVPregistration requiredPre-Talk reception at 5:30pmC. James Taylor and Margaret Hogan

In A Traveled First Lady: Writings of Louisa Catherine Adams, editors Margaret Hogan and C. James Taylor selected excerpts from diaries and memoirs of Adams’s most revealing comments on life at European courts, the difficulty of being an outsider, Abigail Adams’s Quincy, and the importance of society and etiquette in early Washington D.C. She is best remembered as one the capital’s most accomplished hostesses as hundreds of guests regularly attended her Tuesday evenings of conversation, music, dancing, and refreshments. Join the editors for a social evening with Louisa. There will be conversation and refreshments—but no dancing!

Margaret A. Hogan is an independent editorial consultant and the former Managing Editor of the Adams Papers at the Massachusetts Historical Society. C. James Taylor is Editor in Chief of the Adams Papers.

MHS TourMHS Tour: The History and Collections of the MHS8 March 2014.Saturday, 10:00AM - 11:30AMthis event is free

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

Environmental History SeminarThe Galveston Spirit: How a Hurricane Remade American Politics11 March 2014.Tuesday, 5:15PM - 7:30PMSeminars are free and open to the public; RSVP required.Subscribe to received advance copies of the seminar papers.Summer A. Shafer, Harvard UniversityComment: Anthony N. Penna, Northeastern University

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

Public ProgramCreated Equal: The Abolitionists12 March 2014.Wednesday, 5:30PM - 7:30PMPlease RSVPregistration required at no costFilm Screening & DiscussionFacilitated by Joanne Pope Melish, University of Kentucky

The Abolitionists brings to life the struggles of the men and women who led the battle to end slavery.Using this film to ground our discussion, we will explore the lives of the individuals who participated in the antislavery movement: newspaper editor William Lloyd Garrison; former slave, author, and activist Frederick Douglass; Angelina Grimké, daughter of a rich South Carolina slaveholder; Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of Uncle Tom's Cabin; and John Brown, ultimately executed for his armed seizure of the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry. Clips from the film will be shown at the event, and the film can be viewed in its entirety at: createdequal.neh.gov.

Joanne Pope Melish is an Associate Professor of History at the University of Kentucky and a visiting scholar in American Studies at Brown University. She is the author of Disowning Slavery: Gradual Emancipation and “Race” in New England, 1780-1860.

Created Equal: America’s Civil Rights Struggle is made possible through a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, as part of its Bridging Cultures initiative, in partnership with the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History.

MHS TourMHS Tour: The History and Collections of the MHS15 March 2014.Saturday, 10:00AM - 11:30AMthis event is free

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

Public Program, Author TalkThe Lodge Women, Their Men and Their Times17 March 2014.Monday, 12:00PM - 1:00PMthis event is freeEmily Lodge

Like a Whitman poem, the saga of the Lodge family has unfolded in tandem with the history of the great American experiment itself. Yet while the biographies of the Lodge patriarchs have been well-documented, the stories of the influential Lodge women have never been authoritatively chronicled. From the earliest days of the American colonies, through the Gilded Age, and into the first years of the 21st century, The Lodge Women Their Men, and Their Times traces her family’s remarkable history through its female figures, constructing a narrative that is at once intensely personal, political, and wholly universal.

Based on archival research, interviews, and personal memoirs, Emily Lodge presents her ancestors' stories largely through their own voices, heard in a rich collection of personal letters exchanged with the luminaries of their times, whose lives were linked with the Lodges by politics, art, and family: Henry Adams, Henry James, Theodore Roosevelt, John Hay, Elizabeth Cameron and Edith Wharton, some of whose letters are published here for the first time.From her unique descendant’s view on a long line of prominent Lodge women, the author recalls their grace, dash, and political influence through a sweep of history that illuminates the pages with the incandescent human truths of a distinguished family's life and times.

Over the last thirty years a fascination with public policy has taken Emily into government, journalism, business and academia. As a print journalist, she focused on law and the courts. As a speech-writer for a US Congressman and a US Ambassador to France, her domain was foreign policy. As an award-winning television documentary researcher for 60 Minutes, she helped prove someone innocent. Emily won an Emmy Award for a CBS News Special Report about education. On moving to Europe, she became a correspondent for Brussel’s leading monthly business magazine. Her ParisVoice features column were known for their witty and perceptive observations about public figures. She has written brochures for companies and helped create a major fund-raising drive for INSEAD, Europe’s premier business school. A graduate of Georgetown University in diplomatic history, she is currently writing news analysis from the Middle East.

Brown Bag"Dam all pumpkin states": King Williams War in the North and Colonial Legitimacy19 March 2014.Wednesday, 12:00PM - 1:00PMthis event is freeKatie Moore, Boston University

In the spring of 1689, the Dominion of New England collapsed when provisional authorities in Boston and New York seized power. The governor-general was placed under house arrest and the northern garrisons ordered abandoned, exposing the English frontier to ongoing attacks by French and Abenaki soldiers. The following year, ad hoc colonial governments coordinated and launched attacks on Quebec and Montreal. How did Puritan divines and a German militia captain use war with the French to legitimate their authority to colonists, colonial leaders, and Native American allies? How did they justify strategy, finance, and diplomacy? Join us to learn more about this fascinating project. - This event has been rescheduled from February 5, when it was postponed due to snow..

Special EventAn Evening at the Bostonian Society19 March 2014.Wednesday, 6:00PM - 8:00PMregistration required at no costThis event is open only to members of the Jeremy Belknap Circle.

Members of the Jeremy Belknap Circle are invited to an evening at the Bostonian Society located at 206 Washington Street in Boston. Brian LeMay and Nat Sheidley will discuss ongoing plans and lead a tour of the building, including the tower (and its resident ghost). A reception will follow.

Biography SeminarThe Days of Their Lives: Using Diaries, Journals, and an "Almanack" to Recover the Past20 March 2014.Thursday, 5:30PM - 7:30PMSeminars are free and open to the public; RSVP required.Subscribe to received advance copies of the seminar papers.Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, Harvard University; Louisa Thomas, independent scholar and the author of Conscience; Noelle Baker, The Writings of Henry D. ThoreauModerator: Susan Ware, General Editor, American National Biography

This program will feature a conversation with Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, 300th Anniversary University Professor at Harvard, who is using diaries (men's and women's) in her broader study of Mormon history; Louisa Thomas, an independent scholar and the author of "Conscience" (about her grandfather Norman Thomas), who is writing a biography of Louisa Catherine Adams; and Noelle Baker, Editorial Consultant to The Writings of Henry D. Thoreau, who is preparing a digital edition of Mary Moody Emerson's diary.

MHS TourMHS Tour: The History and Collections of the MHS22 March 2014.Saturday, 10:00AM - 11:30AMthis event is free

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

Immigration and Urban History SeminarBoston’s Chinatowns and Recent Senior Migration25 March 2014.Tuesday, 5:15PM - 7:30PMSeminars are free and open to the public; RSVP required.Subscribe to received advance copies of the seminar papers.Nicole Newendorp, Harvard UniversityComment: Wing-kai To, Bridgewater State University

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

Member Event, Special EventNew Faces & New Acquisitions27 March 2014.Thursday, 5:30PM - 7:30PMPlease RSVPregistration required at no costThis event is open only to new MHS Fellows and Members.

Following a reception, new Fellows and Members are invited to join us for a unique opportunity to learn more about and view a selection of the Society's most recent acquisitions, including letters from a stunning collection of Adams and Cranch family correspondence and items from the Civil War archives of Capt. Luis F. Emilio of the 54th Massachusetts Regiment. Enjoy the chance to view Tell It with Pride: The 54th Massachusetts Regiment and Augustus Saint-Gaudens' Shaw Memorial. Please call 617-646-0560 or register online by clicking the ticket icon above.

Special Event, Public ProgramTell it with Pride29 March 2014.Saturday, 12:00PM - 4:00PMPlease RSVPregistration required at no cost54th Massachusetts Volunteer Regiment Company AKathryn Greenthal and Henry Duffy

Visitors are invited to enjoy an afternoon program of exhibition tours and special talks at the MHS related to the Tell It With Pride exhibition.

12:00: Join us for a presentation from the men of the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Regiment Company A, a company of civilian re-enactment personnel who keep alive the legacy of the unit through living history displays, educational briefings to the general public, and Civil War period encampments and re-enactments.

1:00 Time to view the exhibition and for informal conversation with the men of the 54th Regiment.

To Reserve: Click here to register online or call the MHS reservations line at 617-646-0560. Please register if you plan to attend ANY part of this program (even if you can not join us for the entire afternoon).

Larry Ruttman will discuss the four main subjects of his book: baseball; American Jewish life in the United States over the last century; American history; and the revealing personal lives of people involved with the game. Compiled using oral histories gathered from nearly 50 Jewish baseball luminaries (who served the game both on and off the field), Ruttman's book offers an anecdotal study of American Jews and the fellow citizens with whom they interacted during momentous times for America, set against the backdrop of a quintessentially American game that fascinates us all.

Larry Ruttman, Fellow of the Massachusetts Historical Society, is the author of Voices of Brookline, a national finalist for the Award of Merit of the American Association of State and Local History. He has practiced law in Boston for more than fifty years and produces and hosts a television interview show in his hometown of Brookline, Massachusetts.

Early American History SeminarFrom "Disturbers" to Protectors of the Peace: Baptist Church Discipline and Legalities on the Trans-Appalachian Frontier1 April 2014.Tuesday, 5:15PM - 7:30PMSeminars are free and open to the public; RSVP required.Subscribe to received advance copies of the seminar papers.Jeff Perry, Purdue UniversityComment: Stephen A. Marini, Wellesley College

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

Brown BagLiberal Religion and Slavery in America, 1775-18652 April 2014.Wednesday, 12:00PM - 1:00PMthis event is freeChristopher Cameron, University of North Carolina at Charlotte

This talk will explore the disparate ways that liberal ministers engaged with the institution of slavery, whether as proslavery thinkers, colonizationists, or radical abolitionists. It will examine the theological underpinnings of liberals' views on slavery, as well as the differences between Unitarian, Universalist, and Transcendentalists' engagement with the institution.

Public ProgramCreated Equal: Slavery by Another Name & The Freedom Riders2 April 2014.Wednesday, 5:30PM - 7:30PMPlease RSVPregistration required at no costFilm Screening & DiscussionFacilitated by Joanne Pope Melish, University of Kentucky

Based on the Pulitzer Prize–winning book by Douglas Blackmon, Slavery by Another Name tells the stories of men, charged with crimes and often guilty of nothing, who were bought, sold, abused, and subjected to deadly working conditions. Raymond Arsenault’s 2007 book Freedom Riders served as the basis for the film of the same name, which tells the terrifying, moving, and suspenseful story of a time when white and black volunteers riding a bus into the Deep South risked being jailed, beaten, or killed, as white local and state authorities ignored or encouraged violent attacks. Clips from the two films will be shown, and they can be viewed online in their entirety at: createdequal.neh.gov.

Joanne Pope Melish is an Associate Professor of History at the University of Kentucky and a visiting scholar in American Studies at Brown University. She is the author of Disowning Slavery: Gradual Emancipation and “Race” in New England, 1780-1860.

Created Equal: America’s Civil Rights Struggle is made possible through a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, as part of its Bridging Cultures initiative, in partnership with the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History.

History of Women and Gender Seminar"Talents Committed to Your Care": Reading and Writing Antislavery3 April 2014.Thursday, 5:30PM - 7:00PMSeminars are free and open to the public; RSVP required.Subscribe to received advance copies of the seminar papers.Mary Kelley, University of MichiganComment: Elizabeth Maddock Dillon, Northeastern University

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

MHS TourMHS Tour: The History and Collections of the MHS5 April 2014.Saturday, 10:00AM - 11:30AMthis event is free

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

Environmental History SeminarA Mountain in Winter: Wilderness Politics, Economic Development, and the Transformation of Whiteface Mountain into a Modern Ski Center, 1932-19808 April 2014.Tuesday, 5:15PM - 7:30PMSeminars are free and open to the public; RSVP required.Subscribe to received advance copies of the seminar papers.Jonathan D. Anzalone, Stony Brook UniversityComment: Jim O’Connell, National Park Service

Authors will not read their essays but will offer brief remarks; please read the paper ahead of time and come prepared to join in the discussion. If you are not a subscriber to the series (subscribers receive online advance access to the papers) you may pick up a copy at the MHS front desk on the day of the program. Please phone 617-646-0568 with any questions.

MHS TourMHS Tour: The History and Collections of the MHS12 April 2014.Saturday, 10:00AM - 11:30AMthis event is free

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

History of Women and Gender Seminar"How can the wife submit?" African Families Negotiate Gender and Slavery in New England15 April 2014.Tuesday, 5:30PM - 7:00PMSeminars are free and open to the public; RSVP required.Subscribe to received advance copies of the seminar papers.Location: Schlesinger LibraryGloria Whiting, Harvard UniversityComment: Barbara Krauthamer, University of Massachusetts—Amherst

Rescheduled from February 13, 2014.

This paper discusses various ways in which the everyday realities of slavery shaped gender relations in Afro-New England families. While the structure of slave families in the region was unusually matrifocal, these families nonetheless exhibited a number of patriarchal tendencies. Enslaved African families in New England therefore complicate the assumption of much scholarship that the structure of slave families defined their normative values.

When Massachusetts Governor John A. Andrew proposed to raise the first military unit consisting of black soldiers during the Civil War, he was assured by Secretary of War Edwin Stanton that the men would be paid, clothed, and treated in the same way as white troops. As the recruiting posters and newspaper advertisements stated, this included a state bounty and a monthly pay of $13. In July of 1863, an order was issued in Washington fixing the compensation of black soldiers at the laborers' rate of $10 per month. This amount was offered on several occasions to the men of the 54th, but was continually refused. Governor Andrew and the Massachusetts legislature, feeling responsible for the $3 discrepancy in pay promised to the troops, passed an act in November of 1863 providing the difference from state funds. The men refused to accept this resolution, however, demanding that they receive full soldier pay from the federal government.

Teacher WorkshopCanceled:
Tell it With Pride: A Workshop for Educators22 April 2014 to 23 April 2014registration required

This event has been canceled. Please contact the education department for more information: education@masshist.org or 617-646-0557.

Join us as we explore the role of African Americans in Massachusetts in the era of the Civil War!

Day one (April 22) will take place at the Massachusetts Historical Society, where participants can view original documents and artifacts that shed light on the antislavery movement, the work of the 54th Regiment and its supporters, and the creation of Augustus Saint-Gaudens’ memorial on Beacon Street.

Day two (April 23) will take place on Beacon Hill. In the morning, we will take a walking tour through the neighborhood with a ranger from Boston African American National Historic Site. After a lunch on your own at Faneuil Hall, we will regroup for a program at the Museum of African American History, which includes a tour of the recently restored African Meeting House.

This workshop is open to all K-12 teachers and library media specialists. The $55 registration fee covers lunch on April 22, materials, and admission to the Museum of African American History. Teachers can earn 10 Professional Development Points for their participation.

This project examines the networks of men and women who helped support education efforts in the American settlements in Liberia, West Africa. These philanthropists, many of them based in Massachusetts, helped establish formal and informal schools in the former American colonies and planned for a college, which opened for classes as Liberia College (now the University of Liberia) in 1863. How did these American sponsors manage an institution over four thousand miles away?

For Zabdiel Boylston Adams, an 1853 graduate of Harvard Medical School, the Civil War was a watershed and a defining period. On the afternoon of July 2, 1863, the doctor set up a makeshift hospital close to the field of battle. Having noticed how many soldiers were dying during transport from combat to distant medical care, Adams pioneered on-site medical treatments. He labored so long in surgeries at Gettysburg that he was nearly blinded with exhaustion. At the Battle of the Wilderness Adams was severely wounded. Captured by Confederate forces, his shattered left leg useless and gangrenous, he treated himself by pouring pure nitric acid into his wounds, a treatment that must have been as excruciating as it was efficacious. A man at the nexus of two distinguished New England families—Boylston and Adams—at a particularly dramatic moment in history, Dr. Adams is more than an ancestor or historical figure; to his great-grandson, Mitchell L. Adams, he is a legend.

Public ProgramMarching in the Margins: 19th-Century African American Women in the Civil War25 April 2014.Friday, 2:00PM - 3:00PMthis event is freeGallery TalkL'Merchie Frazier, Museum of African American History

Massachusetts women played a vital role in recruiting, supporting, and caring for the men who fought in the Civil War. Learn more about their heroic efforts through Society's current exhibition Tell It with Pride. L'Merchie Frazier, Director of Education at Boston's Museum of African American History will be on hand to discuss some of the evocative photographs and objects on display.

MHS TourMHS Tour: The History and Collections of the MHS26 April 2014.Saturday, 10:00AM - 11:30AMthis event is free

Join us for a tour of the Society's public rooms. Led by an MHS staff member or docent, the tour touches on the history and collections of the MHS and lasts approximately 90 minutes.

The tour is free and open to the public. No reservation is required for individuals or small groups. Parties of 8 or more should contact the MHS prior to attending a tour. For more information please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

Immigration and Urban History SeminarPanel Discussion: American Catholics and U.S. Immigration Policy before the Immigration and Nationality Act of 196529 April 2014.Tuesday, 5:15PM - 7:30PMSeminars are free and open to the public; RSVP required.Subscribe to received advance copies of the seminar papers.Danielle Battisti, University of Nebraska, Gráinne McEvoy, Boston CollegeComment: Justin Poché, College of the Holy Cross

McEvoy’s paper, “‘A Christian and Democratic Attitude’: The Catholic Campaign for Education and Enlightenment on U.S. Immigration Policy, 1952-1957,” examines the Catholic campaign for comprehensive immigration reform during and in the wake of the McCarran-Walter Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, which removed discrimination on the basis of race from federal immigration policy but retained the national origins quota system. Battisti’s essay, “‘Whom Shall We Welcome?’ Italian Americans and Immigration Reform Campaigns, 1948-1965,” examines the efforts of Italian Americans who both assisted Italian immigrants to the U.S. after World War II and who joined in a broader movement to abolish the national origins system and thereby reform the nation’s immigration policies in the 1950s and 1960s.

Jefferson and Hamilton is the story of the fierce struggle—both public and, ultimately, bitterly personal—between two titans. Both men were visionaries, but their visions of what the United States should be were diametrically opposed. Jefferson believed passionately in individual liberty and a more egalitarian society, with a weak central government and greater powers for the states. Hamilton sought to build a powerful national government that could ensure the young nation’s security and drive it toward economic greatness.

John Ferling, a leading authority on late 18th and early 19th century American history, is the author of many books, including Almost a Miracle: The American Victory in the War for Independence, Adams vs. Jefferson: The Tumultuous Election of 1800, Setting the World Ablaze: Washington, Adams, and Jefferson in the American Revolution, and the award-winning A Leap in the Dark: The Struggle to Create the American Republic.